“Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.” - George W. Bush

Monday, March 16, 2009

While we squander ourselves in the Middle East, Latin America turns further left.

The US becomes the repository of all that goes wrong in Latin America. When we gave China a free pass in a ridiculously lopsided trade agreement, the US not only killed off much US manufacturing but also took much of the starch out of the factories in Central and South America.

Cheap Chinese goods transported on subsidized ships filled the stores and bodegas of the Americas. Nascent industries collapsed and a growing underclass fueled with crack and smack spread violence and terror throughout the slums in the southern part of our own continent.

Salvador, a country of six and one half million and two million of them is the US, is the latest American country to select a left-wing government. Many more good people will flee to the US. Along with them will come the refuse of failed ideas.

We continue to consume our treasure and time in the Middle East when our freedom, opportunity and future is in the Americas. We have been screwing around in the Middle East for forty years. Why?

Our presence and attention is needed where it matters and where we can have an effect and that is in our own continent in America.

El Salvador has a new left-wing president. Former journalist Mauricio Funes defeated the ruling right-wing president Rodrigo Avila in Sunday's election, polling 51.2 percent of the votes. He defeated his right-wing opponent from the ARENA party by a mere 60,000 votes.

Mr Funes ) explained the cause of his victory to Radio Netherlands' José Zepeda:

"What matters is not the long time that ARENA was in power, but the way they were in power. (...) A small group got preferential treatment, at the disadvantage of the rest of society. In the end, everybody will rise up against that."The victory seals an historic journey to power for Mr Funes' FMLN party of former Marxist rebels. It also means El Salvador joins the growing tide of socialist-led Latin American countries.

But regional expert Dirk Kruijt told RNW Newsline's Davion Ford that the president-elect is considered a moderate; so is his deputy:"The newly elected president is a former journalist with sympathy for the original guerrilla Frente which transformed in 1992 into the Farabundo Martí political party, FMLN. A late member, and a person who could forge alliances with other parts and segments of the population.

President-elect Funes has always presented himself as a friend of the US. And Sánchez Cerén, the vice president, the representative of the orthodoxy line, stated in several interviews that 'Socialism cannot be decreed from above.'"

Security problems

The regime change will not make much difference for El Salvador's economy, which is not doing too badly. But, Mr Kruit says, the new president has another task on his hands:"The real problem of Salvador is public safety and public security. It is one of the countries with the highest murder rate in the world, in terms of murders per 100,000 inhabitants; it has a stock of small arms that is sufficient to kill 40 percent of the world population, and it is in part terrorised by youth gangs. The country is also suffering from hard crime and organised crime, and that is not attacked by the police authorities."

Shift to the left

El Salvador had been a right-wing stronghold for decades. With the leftward shift in Central and South America, some of the people in El Salvador are saying that the country will become a Venezuelan satellite. But Mr Kruit points out that neither the new man, nor his deputy favour a sharp move to the left, and adds:"The changes will be slow, there is not going to be a process of nationalisation of industry, it wouldn't be in the interest of the national economy, so the claim of a second Hugo Chávez of Venezuela is an enormous exaggeration."The main challenge for the new president is to live up to the hopes of the impoverished one-third of El Salvador's population. The people who elected Mauricio Funes will judge him by his successes in fighting poverty and insecurity in his country.

The way out of our coming gas crisis is--natural gas to power our vehicles, he says. Doesn't disagree with Mat's ideas of electric vehicles, just points out they aren't good enough yet, and, today we'd be getting the electricity most from coal fired plants, if we are so stupid as to nix nuclear.

Says Honda has a natural gas vehicle on the market. And cars could be easily developed to switch from natural gas, to gas, to ethanol.

Bill will be shocked at how quickly his arguments will be debunked when EVs finally make it to mass production. Natural gas can be used, but it makes much more sense to use natural in central power stations. And until bill is willing to move his family to within 1000m of a nuke plant and drink from the water used to cool the reactors, I really don't want to hear from him how safe the are.

SHANGHAI -- Chinese companies have been on a shopping spree in the past month, snapping up tens of billions of dollars' worth of key assets in Iran, Brazil, Russia, Venezuela, Australia and France in a global fire sale set off by the financial crisis.

The deals have allowed China to lock up supplies of oil, minerals, metals and other strategic natural resources it needs to continue to fuel its growth. The sheer scope of the agreements marks a shift in global finance, roiling energy markets and feeding worries about the future availability and prices of those commodities in other countries that compete for them, including the United States.

Just a few months ago, many countries were greeting such overtures from China with suspicion. Today, as corporations and banks in other parts of the world find themselves reluctant or unable to give out money to distressed companies, cash-rich China has become a major force driving new lending and investment.

Wal-Mart plans to open its first Hispanic-focused supermarkets this summer in Arizona and Texas as the largest US retailer continues its drive to expand its dominance of the US grocery business.

The pilot stores, named Supermercado de Walmart, will open in Phoenix and Houston in remodelled 39,000 sq ft locations occupied previously by two of Wal-Mart’s Neighborhood Market stores.

The retailer said that the stores were in “strongly Hispanic neighbourhoods” and would feature a “new lay-out, signing and product assortment designed to make them even more relevant to local Hispanic customers”. The staff will also be bilingual.

Wal-Mart’s Sam’s Club warehouse store also plans to open a 143,000 sq ft Hispanic-focused store called Más Club in Houston this year.

Several leading regional US supermarket chains already operate Hispanic store brands, including Publix in Florida, which operates three Publix Sabor markets, and HEB in Texas, which opened a Mi Tienda store in Houston in 2006.

The markets include elements such as cafés serving Latino pastries and coffee, and full service meat and fish counters.

Obama is playing right into their hands. Nothing new in the ME and a recovery program based on Chinese lending. We can replace every Chinese import with goods made in the Americas. We can create unbelievable wealth and jobs and send the Chinese packing.

Mr Cheney was deriding the Obama choice for Ambassador to Iraq, because he does not "speak the language", but Team43 had no problems sending an Ambassador to Costa Rica that did not "speak the language".

It is understandable in that there are not many Arabic speakers available on the diplomatic roster. The same cannot be held out as an excuse for not sending Spanish speakers to Spanish speaking countries.

Rank disregard for the sensibilities of the other American countries is hubris, through and through. It is a bi-partisan hubris, to be sure.

Hence, when his name surfaced as Blair's choice to chair the NIC, the Israel Firsters went berserk, with Steven Rosen declaring him to be a "textbook case of the old-line Arabism" that infected the Department of State when Gen. George Marshall was secretary.

And who is Rosen?

A former fixture at AIPAC, Rosen faces imminent federal criminal prosecution under the Espionage Act for transferring top-secret Pentagon documents to the Israeli Embassy. Rosen's accomplice, Larry Franklin, is serving a 12-year sentence.Picking up the Rosen dog whistle, the neocommentariat came howling.

Educated at Yale and Harvard Law, Freeman has served his country in Delhi, Taipei, Bangkok and Beijing. He was Ronald Reagan's deputy assistant secretary of state for Africa and Bill Clinton's assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs. George Bush I named him ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Freeman was our man in Riyadh when Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf and 500,000 U.S. troops arrived to evict the army of Saddam Hussein from Kuwait.

Little wonder Freeman was China centric, he's just following the tenents of The Russell Company, as the US has, ever since Teddy sent the Great White Fleet to Asia.

After commenting upon an Iranian drone penetrating Iraqi airspace, westhawks comments end with:

Military supplier countries such as Russia and China, who for their own reasons want to keep up with U.S. military technology, may see a good reason to clandestinely cooperate with countries such as Iran that are on the edge of active conflicts. In such a case, supplier countries such Russia and China would get a chance to test out their UAV technologies through a proxy, gaining experience while preserving deniability. And in order to fully test their UAV systems end-to-end, they could allow their Iranian customer access to the Russian or Chinese secure military satellite communications networks. If this were to occur, small to mid-size military powers such as Iran could enjoy heavy and deep strike UAV capabilities such as those found on Reaper and Predator.

The brief age of U.S. dominance of UAVs and other robotic systems will very likely come to a rapid end. U.S. soldiers in the field will have to learn how to defend against enemy robotic systems. And these enemy robotic systems may be as deeply penetrating and heavily armed as U.S. systems as high-end supplier countries such as Russia and China look for ways to test out their programs in combat conditions.

Says that the UAV was 6 kms into Iraq when it was engaged. Wonder how deep the Israeli could penetrate Iraqi airspace before they were engaged?

That Franklin fella should be shot dead, by a firing squad, fuckin' spy. That Rosen, if convicted, too.

Supporters of a vastly increased defense budget, including many who support the Pentagon’s internal request for $584 billion for FY2010, have argued that Obama’s baseline represents a budget cut in a time of war. They contend that this so-called reduction will unnerve our allies, embolden our enemies and, by ending programs like the F-22 Raptor and slowing down programs like the F-35 and Future Combat Systems, will not only weaken defense but hurt our economy. Objective analysis reveals that these arguments are without merit.

If "Snall Arms Control" is a real issue with the ObamaNation, doug, that's where you'll see the controls emplaced. Upon the ammo, not the weapons.

Easy as pie, really.

So, if Obama lives up to bobal's expectations, they will limit that surplus supply chain of 7.62 and 5.56 surplus brass from public access.

If you are not ready for the revolution, by now, time may be running out, or not.

Stockpiles of ammo, you have to know, or at least have a basic scenario of what the weaponry and ammo will be utilized for. Big difference 'tween a hunting trip, a firefight and a prolonged siege of the homestead.

Franks said it's vital that Arpaio continue his tough stance, especially now that Phoenix is the kidnapping capital of the U.S.

He said the sheriff's opponents are backwards in their thinking.

"I'm just sort of astonished that we keep seeing this trend on the part of the Judiciary Committee especially under the Democratic control here, where they are seemingly more committed to going after the good guys than they are the bad guys." ---'Rat lives in the kidnapping kapital, WIO!

"The pilot programme has been opposed by many lawmakers and by the Teamsters Union, which says that Mexican trucks are unsafe. Because they are largely restricted to short-run hops over the border, most Mexican trucks entering the US are run by so-called “drayage” operations that use older vehicles more likely to fail inspection tests. But a study funded by the US Department of Transportation found that when comparing like with like, Mexican trucks were often safer than their US counterparts."---That's a little difficult to believe.

An image provided by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer shows the front page of the news section of their final edition. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which has chronicled the news of the city since logs slid down its steep streets to the harbor and miners caroused in its bars before heading north to Alaska's gold fields, has produced its final print edition, Monday March 16, 2009. (AP Photo/Seattle Post Intelligencer

Olson has served seven years _ half her sentence _ after pleading guilty to placing pipe bombs under Los Angeles Police Department patrol cars and participating in a deadly robbery of a suburban Sacramento bank.

On Monday, California state Sen. Jeff Denham invoked the bank robbery in a letter to Schwarzenegger asking that Olson not be allowed to return to her adopted state.

In the 1975 robbery of Crocker National Bank near Sacramento, Myrna Opsahl, a 42-year-old mother of four who was trying to deposit a church collection, was killed by a shotgun blast.

"She fled the state, changed her name, and lived a leisurely life of lies and deception in Minnesota, while the children of Myrna Opsahl were forced to grow up without a mother," Denham said in his letter.

The SLA was a band of mostly white, middle class young people best known for kidnapping newspaper heiress Patty Hearst. It also claimed responsibility for assassinating Oakland Schools Superintendent Marcus Foster and was involved in a shootout with Los Angeles police officers that killed five SLA members.

Outrage from the public and politicians over the $165M in bonuses paid out to firm's executives is blowing back on the president and his initiatives.---Meanwhile, the BIG BUCKS go unaccounted for as the Pols stir up populist outrage over the small change.

"Obama is playing right into their hands. Nothing new in the ME and a recovery program based on Chinese lending. We can replace every Chinese import with goods made in the Americas. We can create unbelievable wealth and jobs and send the Chinese packing."

aye, protectionism rearing its ugly head. It is particularly interesting watching from up here in Canada thus allowing an 'outside looking in' kinda perspective. Dealing with the US can be very frustrating. You get pontificating and gnashing of teeth over the benefits of free trade but it seems the US only wants it to occur if they benefit more than others. As soon as the tables are turned the whining, and trade action start. With Canada one long running irritant is Softwood lumber. Countless tribunals ruled against the US but the powerful US lumber lobby keeps the dispute alive and the tables tilted. I've watched with interest as China appears to be beating the US at its own game. Now what, use the military to roll them back?

Speaking of Central America - don't you find it interesting that the only government with a democracy is the one where the US has not meddled with its governance? Costa Rica that is.

"Back in Salt Lake City, Layne Morris isn't buying any of it. He points out that one of Khadr's sisters has publicly advocated jihad and a brother has admitted to smuggling weapons to Al-Qaeda and plotting to kill the Pakistani prime minister. Most recently, Khadr's family showed up at a Toronto courtroom to show solidarity for a terrorist cell accused of planning to use truck bombs to blow up buildings in the city's downtown."

Obama says no quick end to ethanol dispute By Alan Beattie in Washington

Published: March 15 2009 02:37 | Last updated: March 15 2009 02:37

Barack Obama on Saturday said there would be no quick resolution to a dispute with Brazil over restricting ethanol imports to the US, following his first meeting with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

The furor over the huge federal spending under President Obama - a $1.75 trillion deficit, 13 percent - obscures an even more basic question: Does he know what he is doing?

That is, does he know how to do anything other than spend?

His stimulus package, of course, took no special ability: He left the details to Democrats in Congress. But his two other major initiatives - his banking - and mortgage-relief plans - are both flawed and unlikely to solve their respective problems.

Indeed, they're so wide of the mark as to prompt questions not of Obama's ideology but of his basic competence.

The bank-bailout plan seems to be largely stillborn. Having wished that the private sector would flock to invest in toxic assets if offered the right incentives, the Treasury secretary is still hoping. Crossing his fingers seems to have replaced effective policy in his planning.

To date, no massive infusion of private-sector capital seems in view and Washington is doing little more than writing checks to prop up the failing banks. That doesn't take a genius. But the difficult task of relieving the banks of toxic assets so they can rekindle the flow of loans seems to be beyond the ability of the president and his administration.

Perhaps Obama privately isn't so concerned about the banks or the businesses that need the credit markets restored. Those are Republican interest groups, right? But he surely must want his mortgage-rescue plan to work - the homeowners facing foreclosure tend to be Democratic constituents.

But this plan, too, falls far short of the mark.

Incredibly, it excludes anyone who has lost their job and can't afford to make their payments even if they were to spend 31 percent of their income trying to do so. If you can't come close to affording your mortgage, even if only because of a (hopefully temporary) loss of employment, forget about it: Obama is not going to help you.

Nor will he help you if your mortgage exceeds your home's value. One out of five mortgages now falls into this category - and the continued fall in property values will put more and more homeowners in it. But they can expect no help from Obama's rescue plan.

Why would a liberal be so callous? Why would he leave so many out in the cold? Could it be that the administration simply can't figure out how to help these folks? That the president couldn't devise a counter to his financial advisers, who presumably wanted to exclude these folks?

It was Clinton-era Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros who urged Fannie Mae to spend 42 percent of its money buying mortgages for lower-income people and who suggested that they no longer require down payments. And it was his successor, Andrew Cuomo, who upped the ante to 50 percent of the Fannie Mae portfolio.

After Democrats inveigled people to buy homes they could not afford, how can they justify passing a plan that excludes them from assistance?

It appears that Obama is at sea when it comes to financial policy, economic-recovery planning and credit-rescue efforts. We're stuck not only with a socialist but seemingly an incompetent one.

We've got a Russian MIG fighter plane parked at our airport here, owned by some private guy. Flys, too. He doesn't know what to do with it, trying to sell it I think. Not a very useful item, really. I'd rather have a crop duster.

By Brady Dennis and David ChoWashington Post Staff WritersTuesday, March 17, 2009; A01

A tidal wave of public outrage over bonus payments swamped American International Group yesterday. Hired guards stood watch outside the suburban Connecticut offices of AIG Financial Products, the division whose exotic derivatives brought the insurance giant to the brink of collapse last year. Inside, death threats and angry letters flooded e-mail inboxes. Irate callers lit up the phone lines. Senior managers submitted their resignations. Some employees didn't show up at all.

Politicians and the public spent yesterday demanding that AIG rescind payouts that they said rewarded recklessness and greed at a company being bailed out with $170 billion in taxpayer funds. But company officials contend that the uproar is scaring away the very employees who understand AIG Financial Products' complex trades and who are trying to dismantle the division before it further endangers the world's economy.

"It's going to blow up," said a senior Financial Products manager, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for the company. "I have a horrible, horrible, horrible feeling that this is going to end badly."

President Obama yesterday vowed to "pursue every legal avenue to block these bonuses." But that pledge might have come too late. About $165 million in retention payments started to go out Friday to employees at Financial Products, after numerous discussions with the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve.

Attorneys working for the Fed had been examining the matter for months and determined that the retention payments couldn't be touched because AIG would face costly lawsuits and be subject to penalties from states and foreign governments. Administration officials said over the weekend that they agreed with that assessment.

AIG disclosed its retention-payment program more than a year ago, and the amount of the bonuses -- more than $400 million for Financial Products alone -- had been widely reported. But as the payments were coming due in recent days, the White House began to express its indignation.

Pressure on the 370-person Financial Products unit, based primarily in Connecticut and London, grew even more intense yesterday when New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo threatened to issue subpoenas if the company failed to provide details about recipients of the retention payments.

The payments represent only the most contentious of a larger group of bonuses being paid throughout AIG. The company's top seven officials, including chief executive Edward M. Liddy, agreed in November to forgo bonuses through this year...http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/16/AR2009031602961_pf.html==

Washington battles over costly F-22 jetForeign sales are a main sticking point

By Leslie WaynePublished: TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2006

NEW YORK: The F-22 fighter jet, now being delivered to Air Force bases around the country, is the Maserati of the skies. Intended to take on a military opponent that no longer exists - the Soviet Union - it has a cruising speed of Mach 2, twice the speed of sound; its top speed is a Pentagon secret. And with radar-evading stealth technology, it can attack its enemies almost invisibly.

But the F-22's only real battles these days are taking place in the corridors of power in Washington. F-22 supporters have been taking on the Bush administration and Washington budget-cutters who want to limit production to 183 planes because the cost to taxpayers has risen to $350 million per plane...http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/09/11/business/plane.php

You CAN'T make it "stealthy," Mat. And, That's the key to the kingdom.==

I'm not so convinced. You can track acoustic and thermal signatures and calibrate radar software to find your stealthy objects accordingly. I'm not an engineer, but my intuition tells me that this "stealth" sales pitch, is just that, a sales pitch.

182 existing F-22s fill the bill of what is needed to deter Ivan and Charlie Chicom.

Don't need any more of that obsolete weapons platform, not even at $137 million per copy.

No, the age of the manned fighter is all but over, the F22 the last of its' kind. We have all we need to tide US over.

If it can't launch and land on a carrier, it's worthless as a piece of power projection in the 21st Century.

The drones of 2015 will more than surpass the capacities of the F-22.

Ground-launched UAV fighters will be even more revolutionary. They do not need vulnerable fighter bases and really don't need large ground-based radar support that can be jammed. Infrared search and track systems can provide target data to a truck-mounted UAV fighter if radar support is unavailable. Fighter UAVs may have a recovery parachute, so they may be launched to look for enemy aircraft, and if nothing is found, they return home. After the parachute landing, they can be hoisted back on their launcher, refueled, and used again. The US Air Force deployed truck-mounted F-104 fighters during the 1960s that were boosted with small expendable rockets at launch, so the idea of a truck-mounted UAV fighter one half their size is certainly realistic.

This will make the concept of total air superiority against a modern army part of history. Truck-mounted UAV fighters may appear from anywhere, and just one can devastate easy targets like helicopter transports and heavy bombers. Recall that during the 1991 Gulf War, the US Air Force was unable to locate and destroy a single SCUD missile launcher. They proved elusive even after they were elevated to the priority target. In addition, their ballistic launches were detectable by long-range radar, whereas UAV launches are not ballistic.

Therefore, a commander will employ nothing more than agile fighters and UAVs over enemy territory if hundreds of truck-mounted UAV fighters are hidden below. Today's surface-to-air missiles are normally detected from the flash of their rocket engines at launch. However, the launch of a truck-mounted jet-powered UAV fighter using pneumatic assist will be difficult to detect. In addition, escort fighters will find it difficult to chase down and destroy nimble UAVs. A UAV fighter will be much more expensive than today's missiles. The US Air Force recently developed and successfully tested the stealthy X-45 (below) that can fly 0.9 Mach and carry a 3000 lb payload over 650 miles. This is a good start, but US Air Force fighter pilots seemed to have blocked development of a UAV fighter. The production cost of a X-45 is estimated at $15 million a copy.

That's a 10 to 1 swarm capacity that an X-35 varient would have on a F-22, and if one or more of the swarm splash, NO ONE DIES!

Fighter UAVs will prove disastrous for modern air forces dominated by fighter pilots, which explains why the US Air Force refuses to evaluate this idea. While billions of dollars have been devoted to stealthy UAVs for reconnaissance, there is resistance from fighter pilots to even test UAV fighters. The development of fighter UAVs by other nations is just a matter of time. Less sophisticated nations once purchased top fighter aircraft, but they have learned they are no match for a sophisticated well-trained team of aircraft like those of the US Air Force. In addition, the cost and complexity of maintaining a professional cadre fighter pilots is unobtainable for most nations. In contrast, fighter UAVs in storage require no spare parts, no fuel for training flights, and will not be lost during common training accidents. They can be stored in dehumidified bunkers for wartime use decades in the future. While they may become "obsolete" over time, they can always be used in a future warfare since sending them aloft puts no one at risk, except enemy fighters.

"The US Air Force deployed truck-mounted F-104 fighters during the 1960s that were boosted with small expendable rockets at launch"---The good old days!...we probly need to spend money refurbishing out Nukes.BHO will dismantle them instead.

The Navy's Fighter-Plane-Size UAV, the X-47B, Is Unveiled in California

Yesterday at its Palmdale, Calif., manufacturing facility, Northrop Grumman unveiled its first completed X-47B Navy Unmanned Combat Air System. This giant UAV could soon be one of the most lethal unmanned aircraft in the U.S. military.

Manned fighter aircraft are going to be obsolete, no need to build any more, the existing fleet of 182 planes is enough to deter the as yet unbuilt or even designed threat from Charlie Chicom.

The Navy's latest, biggest and baddest unmanned aerial vehicle has just been unveiled. Yesterday in California, Northrup Grumman showed off a completed X-47B Navy Unmanned Combat Air System, the first of two fighter-plane-size UAVs that the company will produce for the U.S. Navy. The second will follow in 2009. The Navy hopes to start flying the X-47Bs next year. The UAV is expected to have the ability to take off from and land on an aircraft carrier, and the Navy plans to start those trials in 2011.

The X-47 was designed to be adept at long-range surveillance because of its large range and high flight ceiling. And despite being a beast—it will have a 62-ft wingspan and weigh around 45,000 pounds at takeoff—the X-47B is designed for stealth. This aircraft shows the Navy's growing embrace of unmanned technology, including both unmanned underwater vehicles and aerial vehicles. But the X-47B would be a technological step forward—besides carrying stealth features, it is supposed to have the ability to execute some maneuvers, such as refueling in midflight, autonomously.

Ivan does not have the capacity to produce those Migs that can come even up on the F-15. So the 182 F-22s and the remaining F15s will just have to "Bridge the Gap" until the next generation of lower cost, unmanned, fighter aircraft take to the skies.

Killing the F-22 program will accelerate the development of the UAV varients.

While there is a sense of optimism surrounding the new fighter, some military analysts note that Zelin’s fifth generation aircraft are really fourth generation fighters with upgraded avionics. One of the important elements that denotes a fifth generation fighter, namely stealth, is not seen with the SU-34, which has 22 square meters of reflecting radar surface versus the United States Air Force’s F-22 “Raptor” with a reflecting surface of 0.003 square meters. (14)

Another Russian Defense Ministry expert source points out that many of the modifications to the Russian fighters (Mikoyan-Guervich MiG-35 or the Sukhoi Su-35) are primarily designed to assist in extending the lifespan of these aircraft and that Russia’s fifth generation fighter program has “largely remained on paper.” (15) In the meantime, an aging Russian aerospace industry workforce, slumping oil prices, and continued cooperation with the government of India (for funding) all play into the development of Russia’s next front-line fighter, as well as meeting Serdyukov’s reform objectives. (16)

By 2015 Ivan may or may not have a proto-type ready, to handle the F-15.

Article at Drudge say hybrid car sales are on the skids now. The American consumer is nothing if not shortsighted. Buy an SUV when gas is low, gas goes high, buy a hybrid when gas is high, gas goes low, switch back the other way. Back and forth.

WASHINGTON — American billionaire Charles Simonyi, a computer software executive who paid more than $20 million to fly to the International Space Station aboard a Russian-built Soyuz capsule in spring 2007, will train for a second Soyuz trip to the space station in spring 2009.

Vienna, Va.-based Space Adventures announced Tuesday that Simonyi will be the first repeat customer since the company began organizing space missions for private citizens in 2001.

The company's sixth customer, Richard Garriott, son of NASA astronaut Owen Garriott, is scheduled to launch to the space station Oct. 12. He is paying about $30 million under an agreement between Russia's Federal Space Agency and Space Adventures.

Warplanes: Army UAV Replacing PredatorApr 15, 2008 ... The army wants 45 squadrons (each with 12 UAVs), at a cost of about $8 million per ... This appalls the air force, which is scrambling to turn fighter and transport pilots ...

It is happening, already, bob.The USAF is fighting the trend to modernize te battlespace. They do not want to admit the 20th Century is over.

The air force and army have already agreed to cooperate on supporting Predator and Sky Warrior UAVs, which will save money for both services. But the air force is alarmed at some of the army ideas for operating Sky Warrior. For example, the army wants to rely more on the software, than trained pilots, for flying the UAVs. In fact, the army will not use pilots at all as operators. This appalls the air force, which is scrambling to turn fighter and transport pilots into Predator operators. The air force does use non-pilots for micro-UAVs (similar to the army's five pound Raven), which are used to help guard air force bases. But for larger UAVs, the air force is concerned about collisions, with other UAVs or manned aircraft. The army believes the future holds technological solutions for this problem. Besides, the army can't spare pilots to man its planned force of over 500 Sky Warriors. The initial order will be for 132 UAVs.

The size of the army UAV force also scares the air force. The Sky Warrior will be carrying Hellfire missiles and Viper Strike smart bombs. The army has also been discussing developing its own version of "JDAM Lite." This would be a hundred pound GPS guided smart bomb, which would have about fifty pounds of explosives. That's about the same bang as the new air force SDB (the 250 pound "Small Diameter Bomb"), which also has a steel penetrator. The Hellfire carries about ten pounds of explosives, and Viper Strike two pounds. The GPS guided 155mm Excalibur artillery shell has about 20 pounds of explosives, and the 227mm GPS guided MLRS rocket, with 150 pounds of explosives. "JDAM Lite" would fit into this arsenal nicely. The air force sees all these army "smart weapons" as replacing the need for air force close air support. That's what the army is thinking, as they want to control their own "death from above," and not be forced to ask the air force (which often turns them down.) The U.S. Army lost control of bombers, after many squabbles with the air force, in the 1960s. Only armed helicopters were left. But now the army is buying over 500 bombers, and the air force doesn't like, and hasn't been able to stop it, yet.

I'm waiting for the day when dRat will publicly thank Israel for all the innovation, technical, tactical, and strategic, its pioneering UAV program has spun. How long do you figure I will have to wait? :)

Now some may want for more, but the argument that the current fleet of 182 planes more than deters Ivan or Charlie Chicom is sound and rational.

It sends that message you think is so important, while we cut out frivilous spending for outdated technologies.

Mount the AIM-120C on that X-47 and you have a super potent hunter/killer at a tenth the cost.

There are 182 of the F22s in the air or in the supply chain, already. It's not as if the plane was never built or fielded. It's deployment will be limited, because it is obsolete, from both an air superiority and cost benefit standpoint.

No dead pilots.

Beter have packed more than just a lunch, be waiting until I hear an apology for stealing and selling US technologies to the Chinese, back in the day.

Well, I should apologize to my suggestion that someone modify the brakes on Murtha’s car. I had that impression but I don’t think anyone should act on it.

The bad part is that Murtha was not that bad, as Crookgressional members went. He never seemed to siphon off tens of millions of dollars at once for his “constituent interests” like say, Ted Stephens and Sen Byrd did. And in one case I even had the job of answering a rather nice letter from him. When a couple of our contractors took on a job, screwed up very badly, and multiplied their problem by making some bad business decisions, they handled it by visiting a certain member of the New Jersey delegation. The NJ Congressman inserted language in the appropriations bill to the effect that the Air Force should apologize for expecting the companies to actually meet their contract requirements and should give them another $250M to assuage their hurt feelings.

The letter from Murtha in effect said “Okay, I know you are being hit with this new Congressionally directed bill. Now let me know right away how much you really need to fix this problem and we will get it taken care of.” Unfortunately, despite my efforts, the robotic Air Force response had to be on the order of “We are not programmed to respond to those words. We have already submitted our officially approved budget. Have a nice day.” Murtha was suitably POed and I can’t blame him.

The thing people have to realize about those infamous Earmarks is that “We have met the enemy and he is us.” Virtually all Congressional earmarks in appropriations bills are not thunk up in DC but by people back home, for whom $250M to fix their screw up with a rocket motor design or $350M to build a bridge for a dozen people to use seems to be right and proper. But in Murtha’s case it is pretty clear that the inspiration flow for at least some of the Earmarks goes the other way – it originates between his ears and those shell companies that receive the money are created to respond to his largess.

Well, enough of this for now. I have to go fix a certain car’s steering. But I won’t touch the brakes.

From Fidel Castro in Cuba to Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua to Juan Perón in Argentina to Juan Velasco Alvarado in Peru, Latin America has a long history of caudillos who usurp power and hold on to it by strumming populist chords. In that sense, Chávez and his acolytes Evo Morales in Bolivia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, and Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua are following a well-worn path. However, the latest is a more virulent strain of authoritarian populism because it is part of an international movement sustained by Chávez's imperialist petrodollar diplomacy and is characterized by hijacking, concentrating, and retaining power through putatively democratic means.

The conscious political empowerment of the powerless and the building of institutions that will effectively defend the rights of all citizens without fear or favor are the unfinished business of the Americas today.

Although many countries in the region have imperfect democratic institutions, the proposition that the rights of individuals would be better protected by concentrating power in the hands of caudillos is more than a little implausible. Indeed, the course of events in Venezuela reveals the abuse of power and corruption that accompanies this authoritarian populist model. Moreover, these caudillos often sow social and racial division as a political tactic, and the unrest that comes with rigged elections and the arbitrary abuse of power stirs instability.

In short, this pattern of authoritarian populism has shaken the confidence of international investors and repelled foreign capital from certain countries in the region.[7]

Magnificent Ronald and the Founding Fathers of al Qaeda

“These gentlemen are the moral equivalents of America’s founding fathers.” — Ronald Reagan while introducing the Mujahideen leaders to media on the White house lawns (1985). During Reagan’s 8 years in power, the CIA secretly sent billions of dollars of military aid to the mujahedeen in Afghanistan in a US-supported jihad against the Soviet Union. We repeated the insanity with ISIS against Syria.